Thursday heapage

I have 29 links open, and other things I want to do today, so just some groups of headlines...

• Politicians
  
  
  
  • House speaker: More records should be open
    
    
  • Employee bonuses disclosed, debated by state legislators (around $2 total)
    
    
  • The chairman of Philadelphia's Committee of Seventy warns candidates: Pay attention to campaign ethics (in a DN opinion piece), asking them to go beyond contribution limits and contracting guidelines to focus the race on issues and ability, rather than running attack ads and other dirty tricks.
    
    
  • AAJane notes that the State Senate is now publishing its votes on a daily basis, a great way to let voters keep track of what their elected officials are up to.
    
    
  • Alert: there's a forum for mayoral candidates tonight! All but Brady are confirmed, with short speeches to precede question & answer time.
    
    
  • The CityPaper offers a collection of small tidbits, but this one caught my eye:

    Former City Controller and onetime mayoral candidate Jonathan Saidel is now Brady's campaign manager and is angling to be chief of staff should Brady get elected.

    I guess that's not holding a grudge!
    
    
  • Bob Casey is getting a taste of the overscheduled life of a US Senator, a month into the job.
  
  
• Campaign finance
  
  
  
  • Yesterday's DN poll has created some amazement/concern that Knox has flown upward in polls on the back of his advertising deluge, and sudden awareness that he has as much money as all his opponents combined.
    
    
  • Councilman Jim Kenney has responded by introducing a bill to level the playing field by overriding all campaign contribution limits once one candidate spends $2 million of his own money, even though he was one of the original folks pushing stricter limits. (Note that Kenney supports Bob Brady for mayor.) Sputters from Nutter and Stalberg...
    
    
  • At least two regular posters at YPP decry this suggestion as a move backward, and call on readers to contact their Council representatives to oppose Kenney's bill.
    
    
  • Marc Stier offers a longer look at the issue (also available here, with comments), including what campaign contribution limits are meant to acheive, and how best to attain those ends in the face of the current challenge. (Take-home: don't slash contribution limits, but do make TV advertising more equally available.)
    
    
  • Dwight Evans and Michael Nutter have both denounced Kenney's solution as the wrong response, and Tom Knox suggests it's a "circling of the wagons" by current insiders.
    
    
  • Personally, I think this last poll has set off a wave of panic among the other candidates, who maybe need to revisit this column by John Baer about Knox's real chances.
  
  
• Casinos
  
  
  
  • The Gaming Control Board will release its rationale for casino site selections today.
    
    
  • Casino-revenue tax to fund PA board
  
  
• Schools
  
  
  
  • A big study find that privately managed schools do no better than those that the school district runs for itself, despite costing more. Supporters argue that they were given the worst schools to handle, but a decision must be made this summer about whether to continue the contracts. More here.
    
    
  • Nationally, hired firms have had little effect
    
    
  • A Daily News editorial is devoted to what to make of this report.
  
  
• Other
  
  
  
  • To help fund the purchase of the "Gross Clinic," the Philadelphia Museum of Art actually sold another Eakins painting.
    
    
  • A state-wide smoking ban proposal has made it out of committee in Harrisburg.
    
    
  • Apparently New Jersey will precede us in testing the lease-your-toll-roads insanity.
    
    
  • Men United: 5 years on, the hard fight continues
    
    
  • Council grills Wachovia lawyer: the bank's handling of low-income neighborhoods (and City Council) may cost it the city's business.
    
    
  • Stu Bykofsky notes that high violence rates increase the appeal of tough solutions (that Rizzo, Sr., might have advocated).
    
    
  • Our Rivers Are the Fate of the City (DN opinion piece)